Bed Sides Separation

[Stubs68]

Please provide advice if you have done this. Picked up a bed a few days ago as a parts bed for my 68. I wanted the better tailgate and the bottom rear bed corners + valance behind the rear bumper as mine are rusted. Although the replacement bed is not the best shape and has creases and dents I hate to chop it up as others may be able to use the sides and front. Looking for advice on how to separate the bed sides from the rear tail light section and still save the bed sides? May end up just chopping just in front of the rear tail lights but I have seen the side separated and it looked to be a fairly clean break. Just not sure how they did this? Any help is appreciated. Thank you!

[Jim100]

I am no expert but there are probably a bunch of spot welds that have to be drilled with spot weld drill. Maybe hard to get at.

[brikar]

If your looking into removing the tail light cap from the box with out cutting then you will have to get at the two flanges that connect the tail light cap to the outer box wall.This means disassembling the box in the order the box was assembled. first you will have to find all spot welds and drill them out and take it from me there are a lot of them. The inner box wall will have to be removed to expose the flange and this is a major job unless you don't need to save the inner walls then just cut them out to expose it. the other problem once you exposed the flange is that the spot welds are about one inch apart and by the time you drilled them all out there won't be much left of the flanges.

To remove the rear main cross valiance is a little easer but again you will have to find your spot welds that attach the bed floor across the top and drill them out. Then drill out the weld like in this picture.

IMG_5219.jpg (82.61 KiB) Viewed 334 times

this removes the tail light cap and main box side support from it. there also will be some welds the will need to be removed from the lower part of the rear stake pocket that attach the floor. once you have the floor removed there is more spot welds holding the box wall support to the valiance circled in the picture.

.If you would like to see more detailed pictures of a disassembled box let me know I have lots or check out my thread. Myself I would just cut out what you need and save yourself all the time and frustration. Hope this helps.

[Stubs68]

Brikar - thanks for your thoughts and pics! Exactly what I was looking for. I need the bed corners and rear valance (behind the bumper). The rest of the bed has holes and creases so I guess I don't feel to bad about just cutting the rear cap off. Will give it a go. Thanks again for your help.